Sailed to Bermuda on the Norwegian Dawn, from Boston, on July 15th. We are a family of 4 with 2 teen daughters aged 13 and 15 and drove down from Montreal, Canada.
As first time cruisers, we had open minds about the novelty, hoped for more good experiences than bad ones and were prepared to view disappointments as leanings not show stoppers. Luckily, our cruise was way more positive than negative. In fact, the negative aspects were mostly revelations of mismatch in our living habits and the hallmarks of any cruise: eating a lot, boozing, casinos and lounging in the sun all day. For light eaters and drinkers, non-gamblers as well as brief sun tanning people, we discovered that cruising might not be the ideal choice for our future vacations, especially when out at sea where you cannot go offshore for something else to do. Bear in mind: this is in no way a bad critic of our cruise but rather a realization that it may not be the best fit for our family. This being said, the cruise itself was superb! We never saw or experienced the negative points shouted by some reviewers of this site (drunken people, obnoxious kids, bad cruise director, etc...) and positives included:
- Ease of arrival and boarding in Boston: drive-in, offload, park, welcome by NCL staff, efficient logging-in process, no lost luggage.